Trump says biggest threat to America is not Russia but 'USA-hating people,' including 'godless' Marxists

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Former Vice President Mike Pence claims Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis are wrong about Ukraine

Former Vice President Mike Pence claims former President Donald Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis are wrong about Ukraine after keynoting the Cheshire County GOP's annual fundraising dinner in Keene, N.H., on Thursday.

Former President Donald Trump said in a video posted Thursday that the biggest threat to the U.S. isn't Russia but rather Americans who hate their own country, including "godless" Marxists promoting progressive ideology.

"Our foreign policy establishment keeps trying to pull the world into conflict with a nuclear-armed Russia based on the lie that Russia represents our greatest threat," Trump said in a video first posted to his Truth Social account. "But the greatest threat to Western civilization today is not Russia. It's probably more than anything else ourselves and some of the horrible, USA-hating people that represent us."

Trump, who announced his 2024 presidential campaign in November, went on to suggest that the U.S. is fostering a culture and implementing policies that are leading to the country's demise.

Former President Donald Trump speaks at the Conservative Political Action Conference at the Hilton Anatole in Dallas on Aug 6, 2022. (Brandon Bell/Getty Images)

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"It's the abolition of our national borders. It's the failure to police our own cities. It's the destruction of the rule of law from within. It's the collapse of the nuclear family and fertility rates, like nobody can believe is happening," said Trump.

"It's the Marxists who would have us become a godless nation, worshipping at the altar of race and gender and environment," he continued. "And it's the globalist class that has made us totally dependent on China and other foreign countries that basically hate us."

Trump's comments came in a three-and-a-half-minute video in which he outlined why he believed the Russia-Ukraine conflict should be ended "immediately" in order to prevent "World War III" and "nuclear Armageddon."

The former president didn't specify what a cessation of hostilities would look like in Ukraine, which Russia invaded in February 2022, but said new leadership is needed in Washington to bring about peace, avert global catastrophe and "dismantle" power structures currently in place.

The Ukrainian military's Grad multiple rocket launcher fires rockets at Russian positions in the frontline near Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Ukraine, on Nov. 24, 2022. (AP Photo/LIBKOS, File)

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"There must also be a complete commitment to dismantling the entire globalist, neocon establishment that is perpetually dragging us into endless wars, pretending to fight for freedom and democracy abroad, while they turn us into a third-world country and a third-world dictatorship right here at home," said Trump, who added that NATO's role needs to be re-explored and the State Department, "defense bureaucracy" and intelligence services must be overhauled.

"These globalists want to squander all of America's strength, blood and treasure, chasing monsters and phantoms overseas while keeping us distracted from the havoc they're creating here at home," he said. "These forces are doing more damage to America than Russia and China could ever have dreamed."

Trump's video comes days after Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has not announced a presidential bid but is widely seen as Trump's top 2024 rival, made headlines for arguing that further supporting Ukraine against Russia's invasion is not a "vital" U.S. national interest.

Olivia Troye, an ex-adviser to former Vice President Mike Pence, lambasted Trump's video as a "horrifying pro-Putin message" and called on Republicans to rebuke it.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis speaks to Iowa voters in Des Moines on March 10, 2023.  (Scott Olson/Getty Images)

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The war in Ukraine has become a contentious issue dividing the burgeoning Republican 2024 presidential nomination field. Pence, a potential presidential candidate, said Thursday that it's "healthy" to have much debate within the GOP but emphasized the conflict "is not a territorial dispute, it is a Russian invasion."

Nikki Haley, former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations — who, like Pence, also served under Trump — criticized both DeSantis and her former boss for their views on the Russia-Ukraine war.

"The Russian government is a powerful dictatorship that makes no secret of its hatred of America," Haley said in a recent statement. "Unlike other anti-American regimes, it is attempting to brutally expand by force into a neighboring pro-American country. It also regularly threatens other American allies."

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"America is far better off with a Ukrainian victory than a Russian victory, including avoiding a wider war," continued Haley, who officially entered the 2024 GOP presidential primary last month. "If Russia wins, there is no reason to believe it will stop at Ukraine. And if Russia wins, then its closest allies, China and Iran, will become more aggressive."

Trump, who has called for Europe to pay equal to, if not more than, the U.S. to support Ukraine, ended his video Thursday by saying he's the only one capable of evicting the "sick and corrupt establishment."